CD Reviews

Alexander the Great

Samuel Chell | Kenosha,, WI United States | 07/28/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Another monster concert by the major player who's been swinging up a storm second to none for better than 40 years. Though this is one of Monty's best trios, the music isn't quite as indispensable as the somewhat later Montreux live date or the earlier "We've Only Just Begun." Still he's on fire as usual, keeping the listener off balance with surprises on practically each new chorus, never letting up on the swing or straying from the groove. He's one of the few artists who can take "period pieces" like "You'll Never Find a Love Like Mine" and "The Candy Man" and make them sound as fresh as the new day. As a player, put him somewhere between Oscar Peterson's virtuoso chops and Ahmad Jamal's colorful tonal palette and spice it up with a good dose of musical humor. He's a superior pianist who chooses to connect with his audiences with high-spirited and tasteful professionalism rather than by abusing them with profanity and playing his precious and portentous, extemporaneously oh-so "original" music that only sophomoric listeners and paranoid jazz writers would call "daring" and "profound" (I won't do Mr. Obsessive-Compulsive the favor of identifying him. He's already profited enough from his notoriety.)

Monty's no prima donna, so perhaps it's not surprising he's ignored in the "jazz polls." But there's no excuse for music like this taking thirty years to be reissued on CD for the first time, and then only as a pricey import. Two huge corporations control the majority of recorded music the world listens to--Universal and Sony--and neither is about to waste its time and money trying to distribute and market creative American music to the American consumer--time and money they'd rather devote to shutting down the latest Russian cut-rate download music service. (This one is a Universal release, with a meaningless Verve label.) At least it's good to know that our loss is someone's gain."